ACCOMACK Co., Va. - A Cygnus spacecraft, dubbed the SS Katherine Johnson, launched from the NASA Wallops Flight Facility on Saturday afternoon
The NASA commercial cargo provider Northrop Grumman launched the spacecraft at 12:36 p.m. on February 20.
NASA said this is the 15th resupply mission to the International Space Station.
The Cygnus spacecraft is loaded with 8,000 pounds of research, crew supplies and hardware. It's expected to arrive at the space station Monday, February 22 around 4:40 a.m.
Expedition 64 Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Soichi Noguchi will capture Cygnus, with NASA astronaut Michael Hopkins acting as a backup. After Cygnus capture, mission control in Houston will send ground commands for the station’s arm to rotate and install it on the station’s Unity module Earth-facing port.
NASA said the highlights of the space station research facilitated by the SS Katherine Johnson are:
- Spaceborne Computer-2, a high-performance commercial off-the-shelf computer system being studied to increase data processing speeds for science aboard the space station
- LambdaVision’s, second experiment headed to the space station to study the advantages of manufacturing artificial retinas in space
- Micro-16, an investigation studying muscle strength changes in worms to help us better understand muscle weakening that astronauts can experience in microgravity
- The Real-Time Protein Crystal Growth-2 experiment, which will demonstrate new methods for producing high-quality protein crystals in microgravity
- A-HoSS, a radiation detection system developed for the Orion spacecraft and certified for use on NASA’s Artemis II mission, the first mission on which a crew of astronauts will orbit the Moon in the spacecraft
- Exploration ECLSS: Brine Processor System, a demonstration in regenerative life support technology that will help provide more clean air and water to the space station crew.
